Students who engage in persistent, challenging behaviors (talking out in class, work avoidance, or out-of-seat behavior, for example) can benefit from behavior plans built from functional behavior assessment.

The goal is to prioritize 1 or 2 of the most concerning student behaviors and identify the school routines/times (e.g., independent seatwork, less structured times such as lunch or recess) in which the behaviors are likely to occur. Then, by looking at what happens before the behavior, or the antecedent, and what happens after the behavior, or the consequences, a hypothesis is generated as to what function the behavior is serving for the student.